Read From the Dust Returned for Free Online Page B

reappeared.
    "Coffins" was next. Coffins, in a row, surrounded by marchers, timed to a flute. One by one coffins were removed. The scramble for their polished interiors eliminated two, four, six, eight marchers, until one coffin remained. Timothy circled it cautiously with his fey-cousin, Rob. The flute stopped. Gopher to hole, Timothy lunged at the box. Rob popped in first! Applause!
    Laughter and chat.
    "How is Uncle Einar's sister? She of the wings."
    "Lotte flew over Persia last week and was shot with arrows. A bird for a banquet. A bird!"
    Their laughter was a cave of winds.
    "And Carl?"
    "The one who lives under bridges? Poor Carl. No place in all Europe for him. New bridges are rebuilt with Holy Water blessings! Carl is homeless. There are refugees tonight beyond counting."
    "True! All the bridges, eh? Poor Carl."
    "Listen!"
    The party held still. Far off, a town clock chimed 6 A.M. The Homecoming was done. In time with the clock striking, a hundred voices began to sing songs that were centuries old. Uncles and aunts twined their arms around each other, circling, singing, and somewhere in the cold distance of morning the town clock stopped its chimes and was still.
    Timothy sang.
    He knew no words, no tune, yet he sang and the words and tune were pure, round and high and beautiful.
    Finished, he gazed up to the High Attic of Egyptian sands and dreams.
    "Thanks, Cecy," he whispered.
    A wind blew. Her voice echoed from his mouth, "Do you forgive me?"
    Then he said, "Cecy. Forgiven."
    Then he relaxed and let his mouth move as it wished, and the song continued, rhythmically, purely, melodiously.
    Goodbyes were said in a great rustling. Mother and Father stood in grave happiness at the door to kiss each departing cheek. The sky, beyond, colored and shone in the east. A cold wind entered. They must all rise and fly west to beat the sun around the world. Make haste, oh, make haste!
    Again Timothy listened to a voice in his head and said, "Yes, Cecy. I would like that. Thanks."
    And Cecy helped him into one body after another. Instantly, he felt himself inside an ancient cousin's body at the door, bowing and pressing lips to Mother's pale fingers, looking out at her from a wrinkled leather face. Then he stepped out into a wind that seized and blew him in a flurry of leaves away up over the awakening hills.
    With a snap, Timothy was behind another face, at the door, all farewells. It was Cousin William's face.
    Cousin William, swift as smoke, loped down a dirt road, red eyes burning, fur pelt rimed with morning, padded feet falling with silent sureness, panting over a hill into a hollow, and then suddenly in flight, flying away.
    Then Timothy welled up in the tall umbrella shape of Uncle Einar to look out from his wildly amused eyes as he picked up a tiny pale body: Timothy ! Picking up himself ! "Be a good boy, Timothy. See you soon!"
    Swifter than borne leaves, with a webbed thunder of wings, faster than the lupine thing of the country road, going so swiftly the earth's features blurred and the last stars tilted, like a pebble in Uncle Einar's mouth, Timothy flew, joined on half his flight.
    Then slammed back in his own flesh.
    The shouting and the laughing faded and were almost lost. Everybody was embracing and crying and thinking how the world was becoming less a place for them. There had been a time when they had met every year, but now decades passed with no reconciliation. "Don't forget, we meet in Salem in 2009!" someone cried.
    Salem. Timothy's numbed mind touched the word. Salem—2009. And there would be Uncle Fry and Grandma and Grandfather and A Thousand Times Great Grandmere in her withered cerements. And Mother and Father and Cecy and all the rest. But would he be alive that long?
    With one last withering wind blast, away they all shot, so many scarves, so many fluttery mammals, so many seared leaves, so many wolves loping, so many whinings and clusterings, so many midnights and dawns and sleeps and